


Servis vs. The Approach

by jenny_of_oldstones



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Depictions of Child Slavery, Gen, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-10
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-05-04 07:17:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 20,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14587833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenny_of_oldstones/pseuds/jenny_of_oldstones
Summary: The Western Approach has been a graveyard for Tevinter enterprise since before the Second Blight. Crassius Servis, the crafty and newly appointed commander of Venatori forces in the Approach, has no intention of dying there.The demons, monsters, and Inquisition beg to differ.





	1. Chapter 1

“I admit, I'm surprised you volunteered for this assignment." Erimond held out his goblet and a slave boy stepped forward to fill it. “Most men would shrink at the prospect of taming the Approach. The darkspawn and blighted soil are usually enough to put off even the most stalwart of adventurers.”

“It is an honor to serve the Elder One.” Servis held out his own goblet. “And where other men see insanity, I see a challenge.”

The sun beat down on their table in the center of the courtyard. A slave fanned them with an ostrich feather, while six other slaves stood at attention in sweat-drenched silks. If it was not for the dusty, crumbling sandstone walls around them, one might think they were in a villa on the Boeric Coast, instead of inside an ancient Imperium prison at the edge of the Western Approach.

Not that Servis was uncomfortable. Coracavus was hardly the first ruin he had drunk wine in. He was, after all, an archivist who made his trade buying and selling ancient relics from plundered tombs and necropolises in the far-flung corners of the world. That his current employer was a darkspawn demi-god was an interesting detail, but business was business.

“The Approach has a long history of devouring unlucky Tevinters,” said Erimond. “That does not give you pause?”

“Not in the least,” said Servis. “I have no intention of joining my unfortunate predecessors.”

“Bold claim, though I suppose your credentials do back it up. Val Dormin, the tomb of Dieter III, Seheron—”

“I am no stranger to overseeing excavations, my lord,” Servis chilled his wine with a tap of his finger. “You can count on me to bring succor to your cause.”

“Our cause,” said Erimond.

“Our cause,” corrected Servis. “You’ll find me nothing less than loyal in my service.”

The slaves stood still as statues, staring straight ahead as flies buzzed around their pointed ears. Servis brushed his fingers over a bowl of water and splashed a few drops on his face.

“Truth be told," said Erimond, "I inquired into some of your contacts. They had a great deal to say about your discretion, and your ability to smuggle goods across borders undetected."

"If you are concerned about me absconding with artifacts that rightly belong to you, bear in mind that the Venatori are loyal to you first and foremost. They will report on me as regularly as I report to you."

"And if I should discover you have been stealing from the Elder One?"

"You are a creative man," said Servis. "I'm sure you already have a few ideas in mind for how to deal with traitors."

Erimond gave him a tight smile. He slid an open lacquered box across the table, within which was the writ of Servis's appointment.  

“The terms of your post are simple,” said Erimond. “Maintain a Venatori presence, defend the desert against incursion, and secure any artifacts that might aid us.”

“And you will be—?”

“On a mission of my own import,” said Erimond.  “You will be given full command over the Venatori, and the White Claw mercenaries you had the foresight to hire. The Red Templars will be mining to the west. You will have authority over their operation, but I would not attempt to demand deference from them. They follow their own command.”

“So long as they stay on their side of the desert, we will have no quarrel.”

“They do not disturb you?”

“Our spiky red friends have as much a role to play in the glory of the Elder One as any. I simply see no need to encourage conflict.”

“I see. And who will you send to oversee them?”  

Servis plucked an iced fig from their meager spread and brushed it across his lips. There was a test here and a mild threat, and a man of his mercantile experience was no stranger to either of them.

“I will send Cassius to represent our interests.”

“The man with the hare lip?” asked Erimond.

“Yes.”

“I would not want to look at him either.”

They had a good chuckle at that. A breeze lifted the tablecloth under their luncheon like a skirt. The eastern wall of the courtyard had long crumbled, leaving an impressive view of the desert far below. Griffon Wing Keep sat sullen and desiccated to the south, and beyond it was the blighted black scar that ran several miles straight down into the Deep Roads. As they watched, a green spark flashed over the top of a dune and disappeared.

“Did you see it?” asked Erimond.

Servis had. There were no shortage of rifts in the desert. It was so easy to stumble across one, invisible as they often were from one angle, then suddenly, violently apparent the next. They would hang in the air like a seam in the world, lovely and silent, until they sputtered and transformed into an evil green rectum that shat out demons.

“I'll make sure the Red Templars keep the demons pruned,” said Servis. “They should be more than up to the task.”

“They are magnificent,” said Erimond, not hearing him. “So many times I have stood at the edge of one and reached out my hand to feel the currents of the raw Fade, only to snatch it back moments before I was ripped apart. We have been given the gift of witnessing a greater, purer world in the making, one rift at a time, all thanks to the Elder One. And now he is undoing His work.”

Servis did not have to ask who “he” was.

Erimond sat back in his seat and folded his hands on his stomach. “There is always a chance Inquisition scouts will follow our activity this far west.”

"It’s a large desert. A handful of scouts can easily be picked off. The Inquisition has far more pressing concerns than scouring a desert for tomb raiders.”

“Your confidence is commendable. You do not fear him?” asked Erimond.

“I don’t plan on meeting him face to face, so no,” said Servis. “Though his reputation does leave one a little squeamish.”

“And if you did?”

Again, that smug tone. Servis gave a shrug. “Then I will defend my post to the death.”

Erimond gave him an oily smile. The magister did not believe him, but the question had not been asked in the interest of honesty. Erimond returned his gaze to the place where the rift hung above the dune.  

“He has enjoyed some minor victories. But he is a fool building sandcastles against the tide. Whatever gains he made will soon be smashed to dust by the fury that awaits him at Adamant.”

“To the Elder One,” said Servis loyally and held out his goblet.

“The Elder One,” said Erimond and clinked their goblets together. He drained the dregs of his wine then set the goblet aside. “Come,” he said, “I will show you your quarters.” 

 

* * *

 

Their armor jangled as they marched from the courtyard into the ruins. Coracavus had been abandoned since the Second Age, and the desert had long reclaimed it. Most of the interior structures had deteriorated over the centuries, with walls collapsed, ceiling panels fallen, and entire floors collapsed in on each other. There was no room in the prison that was not filled with sand, and all rooms were subject to the heat of the sun.

Erimond led Servis through the south entrance into the atrium, the attendant slaves following in twin columns behind them. Dragon statues looked on, while dust hissed down from the spiderwebbed ceiling. The slave boy who had filled their goblets carried the plate with their wine behind them.

“There is a great deal of rubble in the northern entrance that will need to be cleared,” said Erimond. “You have plans for how to dispose of it?”

“I may have an idea in mind for the heavy lifting.”

“Oh?”

“I purchased a giant,” said Servis.

“I see,” said Erimond. “And do you have experience with giant handling?”  

“No, but that’s why I also purchased the services of a handler.”

The quarters Erimond led him to were at the northern wing of the prison. A slave opened the door for them, and they stepped inside. The room was a meager quarters with a writing desk, a floor rug, a trunk, and a bed. The windows were bare and covered with silk screens. Here, as with everywhere in the prison, all surfaces were covered in a fine layer of sand. Servis crossed to the window. The view was of a dry little gully with a bleached horse skeleton at the bottom.

“I trust this will be sufficient?” asked Erimond.

“I have everything I need here and more,” said Servis. “I am no wilting flower, my lord. You do not have to worry for my comfort.”

“In that case, if you have no other questions, then I will ride within the hour. I leave Coracavus in your capable hands. The Western Approach is yours.”

Servis felt himself relax. He had expected worse from Erimond, but he would settle for an early exit. There was a great deal of work to be done, most of which could not get started until the magister was well on his way out of the Approach.

Then Erimond paused at the door. “Though, there is one small matter. You are aware of the two gates that lead to Coracavus from the north and south?”

“I am.” Servis had ridden through the Gates of Toth to the north that morning. “What of them?”

“We have been securing them with magic—in the usual way.”

Erimond seized the elf boy by the arm. The tray and goblets clattered to the stone. A silver dagger slid into Erimond’s hand from his sleeve. The boy’s eyes widened, and the knife cut into the soft flesh of the inside of his arm. Erimond flicked his wrist, and blood ribboned out.

“You may use this one,” said Erimond. “Send a Venatori to seal the wards before the sun sets. Done properly, the seals will last a week.”

Servis kept his face neutral. Erimond was a magister. If he wanted to bleed a slave to death every time he had a prickling of academic curiosity, or in this case, to seal a gate, he certainly had the right to do so.

The test here was to make sure that Servis was loyal to Tevinter. Not Tevinter the country, but Tevinter the ideal. To flinch at killing a slave for the purpose of blood magic would have been a _faux pas_ beyond imagining and as good as a declaration of weakness. The correct course of action would be to carve up the child and use the pieces to seal the gates as instructed. The seconds were ticking by, and Erimond was sizing him up, weighing his deficiency. It would be wise to obey.

And yet.

There was a part of Servis—some men might call it a flaw—that squirmed in delight. He was being told to zig, and the reckless, foolish part of him that had dragged him out into the worst wastelands in the world, could not help but zag.

He could never resist testing his luck. 

“With all due respect,” he said, with his most ingratiating smile, “I believe that would end up being a waste of resources.”

Servis raised a hand, made a scissors with his fingers, and cut the magic between the boy’s blood and Erimond as if it was a string. The spell dissipated, and Erimond’s smile faded.

“We have more than enough lyrium to secure the gates,” said Servis. “If we must dip into the supply owed to the Red Templars, it will make them work all the harder. As for the boy—”

He spared the child a glance. The boy was grimy and covered in flea bites.

“I lack a scribe,” said Servis. This was true. The old slave Servis had intended to use had died on the way out west. “This one seems quick. He can be my runner. If it please you, my lord.”

Erimond’s eyes had gone hard. They shone out of his head like little black beetles. He rubbed the bloody tips of his gloved thumb and forefinger together slowly.

“Very well,” said Erimond.

The elf boy let out a breath. Erimond stood and gave him a pat on the head.

“Does he have a name?” asked Servis.

“Cadril,” said Erimond. “Seheron-bred and a mute, but more than up for whatever service you require him for.” He hooked a finger under the iron collar the boy wore around his throat. “Be a good lad for your new master,” he said, and then, to Servis, “I will not tell you how to do your job. No doubt you know how to manage resources in these extremes better than I.”

The magister gathered his staff and went to the door.

“Still, the Approach does not forgive. Mind that you remember that I do not either.” Erimond gave him a cold smile. “Glory to the Elder One.”

“Glory to the Elder One,” said Servis, and bowed. “I will not fail you, my lord.”

“No. You won’t.”

Erimond went out, the other slaves trailing behind him, leaving Servis alone with his new scribe. The moment Erimond’s footsteps receded, the boy slumped. He began to pick at the cut on his arm as if he were alone with himself.  

_Your old master put the fear of the Maker in you. Well, we’re both in it now._

Servis gave him a slap about the back of the head. Cadril mouthed an _ow_ and rubbed his scalp, glaring up at him.

“Clean up this mess,” said Servis. The boy’s blood had piddled on the flagstones and mixed with the spilled wine in the grout. “And when you’re done, bring my luggage in from the courtyard. We have letters to write.” 

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

> Macrinus—
> 
> You are hereby entrusted with the post of Griffon Wing Keep. Its restoration and defense are in your hands.
> 
> I expect full reports on the fortress’s reconstruction. Any artifacts you find are to be sent to Coracavus through the Gates of Andoral.
> 
> I also expect reports on daily patrols. Artorius will be in charge of them. We cannot be too careful. Though the Inquisiton is unlikely to stray this far West, we must remain vigilant to their interference. Any caravan, trader, or traveler who witnesses our forces must be detained and silenced.
> 
> Glory to the Elder One,
> 
> Servis

* * *

 

 

> Artorius—
> 
> Keep an eye on Macrinus.
> 
> The man will cut corners as soon as my back is turned. I expect a detailed report of his goings-on.
> 
> In addition to patrols, make sure our men are searching for artifacts and arcana. Keep one book for what we send to Corypheus, and a second book for obvious reasons. Our Carta contact is ‘Regilus,' and she is camped past the oasis at Wolf’s Crest.   
> 
> I don’t need to tell you to burn our correspondence, but I will anyway.
> 
> Servis

  

* * *

 

>  
> 
> Lucanus—
> 
> You were the first Enchanter of the Circle of Trevis. These “Still Ruins” as you call them are well within your purview.
> 
> You are more than capable of handling a few demons. Ignore the rift and continue exploration. Records point to the ruins being a source of singular power that predates the First Blight. I want a full mapping of the site and all possible digs listed within the week.
> 
> Spare me your superstitious ramblings in the future, or you’ll find yourself in Cassius’s job.
> 
> Servis.

 

* * *

  

 

> Cassius,
> 
> How fare our Red Templar friends?
> 
> As per their request, any travelers we come across will be sent to their “resource mines.” Travelers, refugees, whoever you find on the roads. I really do not want to know.
> 
> If you must, use the White Claws to watch the passes. Make sure we get our money’s worth out of them.
> 
> Servis

* * *

 

 

> Magister Livius Erimond of Vyrantium,
> 
> My lord,
> 
> The Excavation goes splendidly. Already we have unearthed scrolls pre-dating the Second Blight, detailing how to enhance the power drawn from a drained sacrifice that I trust will be of great benefit to the Elder One. I have included a basket of the choicest samples for your perusal and pleasure.
> 
> Your loyal servant,
> 
> Servis

* * *

 

>  
> 
> Ferox,
> 
> I have found a buyer for the talismans we unearthed last week. A supply cart is being sent to our camp at the oasis camp. Dismantle the lyrium forge and stuff its pieces in the grain bags. Our Mutual Friend in the camp will reassemble them on his way north and have it ready for shipping, care-of-post Carastes.
> 
> Put none of it on the shipping manifest.
> 
> Servis

* * *

 

 

> Servis—
> 
> Bunch of Orlesians rode in last night on a big caravan. They set up shop down by where the dragon was sighted last week. Seven men, three women. They look like they’re staying for the long haul. I told one of the Claws to pretend to be a hunter and go see what they’re about, and he said they’re here to study the dragon. They brought traps to lure it and everything. Daft. 
> 
> I figure we feed them to the Red Templars. It wouldn’t be the first time an academic mission went missing. Your orders?
> 
> Octavian

* * *

 

Servis tapped his quill on the writing desk.

The morning sun shone hard through his windows. Cadril sat lazily in the corner, scratching at a flea bite between his toes. The letter from Octavian was the last of the morning stack of correspondence, and it made Servis wish it was past noon so he could start on the wine.

In the three weeks since Erimond had left him the command of Coracavus, there had happily been no serious threats in the areas patrolled by the Venatori. These Orlesian researchers represented an interesting tangle. It was only a matter of time before they ran into a Venatori patrol and, unless they were blind, deaf, and dumb, became aware of the presence of Tevinter mages in the area. They could, of course, not be permitted to leave the desert, but so long as they were here….

The Abyssasl High Dragon had carried off one of the Venatori patrolmen just last week. If they could actually catch a dragon, it would be a boon in more ways than one.

Servis knew a liberati in Trevis who would pay mint for an Abyssal High Dragon skull. There was a man in Qarinas whose contact list he had been trying to get into for years who bought dragon gall bladders for top coin and turned them into aphrodesiacs. A Nevarran cousin of his used dragon talons to make her high-priced furniture, and there was no telling what the Circle of Vyrantium's Draconology department would give for an intact fire sac. And if the bitch was full of eggs….

* * *

 

> Octavian—
> 
> Do not molest the researchers. If they can bring down a dragon, we can harvest its parts to strengthen the armor and weaponry of the Elder One’s army.
> 
> Have the White Claws keep an eye on them. Investigate their methods, but stay out of sight. If they look like they’re packing up to return home, kill them and collect their equiptment.
> 
> Servis.

* * *

  

A knock came at the door. Cadril stood up and opened it. An older slave, whose name Servis could not remember, cleared his throat.

“Dominus, the giant has just arrived.”

Servis put his quill down. Now this would be interesting.

 

* * *

 

 

The walk from his quarters to the upper courtyard was slightly less of a trudge than it had been that first day with Erimond. The sand had been shoveled from the main corridors, and the prison echoed with the sounds of excavation.

The ting of pick-axes and hammers grew louder as Servis strode into the main atrium. Slaves called out to each other and steered carts of rubble up wooden boards placed over staircases. The main dig was taking place below, down in the prison’s dungeons, where the records indicated the worst arcane tortures and experimentations had taken place. Venatori overseers, most of them seated under parasols to spare them the sun falling through the broken roof, stood as Servis walked past them.  

Halfway up the staircase to the main courtyard, a roar shook the walls.

Cadril gasped and grabbed the hem of Servis’s cloak. Servis rapped him across the knuckles with his staff and continued up the stairs.

Two-dozen slaves were tugging on chains in the courtyard. The giant knelt in the center of them, an iron collar around its neck, arms, and ankles. The beast’s single, ridiculously long-lashed eye flickered up at Servis.

“Are you certain we need this thing?” drawled Perindus. The Venatori captain’s peaked hood shielded his greasy brow from the sun.

“If we want the rubble cleared in the upper levels by Justinian, then yes,” said Serivs. “I understand the Templars used them to great effect in the Emprise. Once properly shackled, they can be made to do as they’re told like any servant.”

Perindus sighed. “When you hired me, it was under the impression that I would be training draconids, not giants.”

“The Elder One ever has faith in you,” said Servis.

Perindus shook his head. He unsheathed a blade from his hip and beckoned a nearby slave forward. Cutting into the elf’s wrist, he pulled a wellspring of power from his blood and pointed a finger at the giant. A burning palm print burned into the giant’s brow. It howled in outrage, and for one terrifying moment, its muscles bulged against its restraints. The slaves screamed, but then it relaxed, and its eye shuttered to half-lid.

“There!” Perindus pointed with his staff at a pile of rubble that blocked the northern gate.

The giant got to its feet. The courtyard rumbled under its slow gait as it made its way to the rubble. Its arms came around the largest boulder, wrapped around it, and lifted it as easily as if it was a tumbleweed. The courtyard broke into applause as it set it down in the far corner.

“Impressive,” said Servis. “Those chains are strong enough to hold it?”

“The dwarves who sold it to us said they were strong enough to restrain it on the road,” said Perindus. “Along with some unorthodox methods.”

“Oh?”

“Heads of lettuce soaked in whiskey and brine,” said Perindus. “Kept the damned thing flat-out drunk.”

“Un,” said Cadril.

They both looked at him. The elf boy flinched under their gaze, alarmed to have drawn attention to himself, then straightened his back in defiance.

“That one’s poorly trained,” said Perindus. “Why did he make that noise?”

“It’s what he does,” said Servis, drily.

Over the last few weeks, Servis had learned that, mute though the boy might be, he was more than capable of showing his impudence. It had been recommended by other slaves that the best way to curb this attitude was to give him the lash, but Servis found the idea beneath him. It was one thing to be the master of one’s slaves, it was quite enough to be their nursemaid. As poorly as it reflected on him, Servis found he could not be bothered to make up for the bad behavior of a child.

Because Perindus was watching, however, some face must be saved.

“Do you have some advice for the captain?” asked Servis. “Some sage knowledge you would like to share with us?”

There was a chuckle around the courtyard. Cadril looked up at him blankly, then pointed at the giant.

Servis followed the line of his finger. The manacles around the wrists and ankles of the giant, he saw now, were made of cheap pig iron and rusted at the joints.

“Oh,” said Servis. “It seems he does have advice. Perindus, you said the dwarves gave us those chains?”

“They were sold with the giant,” said Perindus, then hesitated. “If the beast were capable of breaking them, it would have done so by now.”

“I see.” Servis rubbed his stubble, thinking. “I suppose we don’t have the means to repair them, in any case. Do we have enough whisky to keep it inebriated?”

“I think so,” said Perindus. “Though the men will not be happy about it draining the casks.”

“They’ll be happy not to be breaking more rocks,” said Servis, and gave his scribe a nod. “Well done, Cadril.”

The elf boy scratched at his flea bites. Servis was spared from having to reprimand him by a breeze that stirred up the odor of the giant. “And make sure it cleans up after itself. Sweet Maker.”

“Aye, ser.”  

As Servis turned to leave the courtyard, the older slave from earlier matched his step. “My lord, there is one other thing. The men have complained that they hear noises coming from below in the cells.”

“Speak up, Archivus,” said Servis, suddenly remembering his name. “What kind of noises?”

“They are not sure. Tapping noises from behind the walls. Sometimes it sounds like scuttling, but too large to be a rat. It has them concerned, my lord.”

Servis dragged his teeth across his tongue, trying to scrape off the reek of the giant that now clung to the back of his throat like a fungus. He beat a hasty retreat to fresher air.  

“It is likely old water trapped beyond the walls. Do not bring such a trivial matter to me again.”

“Yes, my lord.”

Servis then returned to his quarters to smoke his pipe and pour himself some wine. The hot day turned to freezing night, and Cadril curled up on his cot in the corner. The day’s work completed, Servis blew out the lantern and slid gratefully into bed and thought no more of the troubles of the Approach.


	3. Chapter 3

> Servis,
> 
> Lost three men down in the valley. Eight terror demons poured out a rift and tore poor Fabian to pieces. Graccus got split nose to nuts by one that came up out of the ground. We managed to lose them by running back to the keep, but one of the slaves fell behind. He was carrying the keys to my dresser, so a man had to go back and sift through the pieces to find it again.
> 
> That was only yesterday. Last week, I had six with sunstroke and one half-dead from a snake bite. A scout was lost to what we think was a phoenix, and a horse got taken by a hyena.
> 
> I don’t know what sort of luck you’re having with the dig, but it better be worth it. There’s not a damned thing in this desert that doesn’t want to kill us. 
> 
> Macrinus
> 
>  

* * *

    

> Servis,
> 
> If Macrinus doesn’t shut up about the heat I’m going to strangle him.
> 
> Does he realize the rest of us have to sleep in the barracks? Where the windows let the sun in all day and roast it like an oven?
> 
> Either he knows I loathe him or he's growing suspicious of my insistence to maintain the shipping manifests.
> 
> To make matters worse, I sent word to Regilus that I know he’s underpaying. The coin he gave us for the forge wouldn’t retool my boots.
> 
> Artorius

 

* * *

   

> Servis,
> 
> These Templars give me nightmares.
> 
> The ones that don’t eat raw flesh look at me as if they want to eat _my_ flesh. Some of them retain their wits, but many might as well be fiends.
> 
> There was a mine collapse yesterday. They’re still digging out the bodies. Thirty slaves in all killed, and the body count still rises. The Templars keep glaring at me as if I had something to do with it. The way they chitter at each other like monkeys, I’m sleeping with my staff in my hand.
> 
> Thank you for giving me this post.
> 
> Cassius

 

* * *

     

> Servis,
> 
> We have uncovered an artifact I believe to be worth more than anything else we’ve unearthed in this accursed desert. It teems with a terrifying energy, suspended in the air in the rearmost chamber of the temple.
> 
> I believe the power that surrounds this place eminates from this gem. Time moves strangely here. There are rooms suspended as if in amber, parchment that should turn to dust at a touch as crisp as the day it was printed seven ages ago. The rift in the central atrium sparks angrily some days, at other times seems to hang in the air like an ornament.
> 
> Two of my slaves have disappeared, as well as seven-hundred of our gold. Whether they were taken by dread magic or simply ran away, I cannot waste my resources searching for them. Tomorrow, I will attempt to remove the gem.
> 
> Lucanus
> 
> p.s. – Maker save me, write to my son if I do not return. You can do that much for me, Crassius.

 

* * *

  

> Servis,
> 
> Two of your White Claws murdered each other with arrows. The idiots put apples on their heads and tried to knock them off each other, and instead shot themselves in the face.
> 
> Where do you find these people? Why am I the one babysitting them?
> 
> Octavian

 

* * *

 

> Magister Livius Erimond of Vyrantium,
> 
> All goes well. You will find a progress report included with the most recent relics we’ve unearthed.
> 
> Coracavus is almost complete habitable by now—or at least as good as it will ever be. The barracks are livable, our well is clean, and the vermin have been rooted from the larder. Within a month we have made this prison a permanent outpost claimed in the name of the Elder One. I look upon it with pride and know you will be impressed the next time you visit.
> 
> Also included is a list of resources I most humbly ask be sent to us. We have encountered some minor inconveniences, barely setbacks, that have forced me to reevaluate our stores for the comings months. Such things happen. I know you will understand.
> 
> Your loyal servant,
> 
> Servis

 

* * *

 

Servis uncorked the wine and quaffed it straight from the bottle. Recorking it, he set it aside, stacked his letters together, and forked them over his shoulder.

“Take these to the stables to be sent out,” he murmured.

Cadril took them from them. As he reached for the door to leave, someone knocked on it. He glanced back at Servis, who waved a finger. He opened the door, and Archivus peeked his head in. “My lord, ah, there is a bit of an issue.”

Servis sighed. “Whatever could it be now?”

“Perhaps it would be best if you saw for yourself.”

 

* * *

 

They walked through the prison to the upper courtyard. As they mounted the top step, Servis’s boot came down in a puddle of blood.   

“ _What_ —”

Perindus lay on the ground before him. Or half of him, at least. The bottom half lay crumpled against the far wall of the courtyard, under a streak of blood that ran down the entire height of the wall. Cadril came from behind Servis and gaped at it.

The giant lay on its back in the middle of the courtyard, snoring.

“I’m afraid the beast did not respond well to one of his commands,” said Archivus. “I believe Lord Perindus may have given it too much drink.”

“You believe?”

“It is a riddle, my lord. The beast seemed peaceful until now.”   

Servis dragged a hand down his face.

“And where was everyone else while the captain was getting torn to pieces?” Servis cocked his head. “Can you riddle me that, Archivus?”

The old slave stared at him impassively. “I imagine they ran once the beast began rampaging, my lord. We assumed a mage of Lord Perindus’s caliber would be more than up to the task of subduing it.”

Servis let out a sigh. At least they had gotten most of the rubble in the courtyard cleared before…this. He prodded Perindus’s back with his boot and grimaced when the leather came away wet. “Give the beast a sleeping drought for now until I can figure out what to do with it.”

“With all due respect, without anyone here who can tame it, it might be best to kill it while it sleeps.”

“If we do that, the corpse will stink up the entire prison. Just let it have its holiday.”

“As you wish,” said Archivus. “And Lord Perindus?”

“Collect the pieces and stuff them in a crate.”

At that, two Venatori standing off to the side exchanged glances. Servis felt a prickle of unease. There was something conspiratorial in that glance, something mutinous. Perindus might have been a nug’s arse, but he was known to indulge the men. His death would not be taken well.

“We’ll give him a service tonight,” said Servis. “To our fallen brother. Glory to the Elder One.”

“Glory to the Elder One,” said the Venatori and thumped their breasts. Archivus mumbled the words. Cadril poked at Perindus with his toe.

“Would you like a letter sent to Lord Erimond alerting him of this mishap?” asked Archivus.

“I’ll mention it in the next status report,” said Servis, with no intention of doing so. “I want this courtyard cordoned off for now. No one is to enter it, and the giant’s food is to be thrown at it from the stairs. Dismissed.” 

As Servis started down the stairs, the old slave said, “My lord, there is one more thing…”

“Archivus, unless the Elder One himself is here for tea, I don’t want to hear it.”

“He is not, my lord. But the diggers below have been hearing scratching noises—”

Servis threw his hands up. “If it’s rats, or spiders, or nugs, grab a shovel and deal with it. Don’t bother me for the rest of the day unless the sky is falling or you’ve dug up something that will make us rich.”

With that last remark, he gathered up his robes and returned to his quarters.

 

* * *

  

It turned out the scratching noise was darkspawn.

Servis did not think of himself as a coward. He was more than capable of fighting if need be, and had never backed down from a duel he could not talk his way out of. Dawnspawn were another matter entirely. When Archivus hammered on his door at half past midnight, he had opened it expecting to clout the slave on the ear.

Instead, Archivus had fallen forward the moment he opened the door and left a widening pool of blood on the rug under his face.

Servis grabbed his staff and dashed out into the hall. As he neared the atrium near the excavation site, screams echoed up the corridors above the clashing of blades. Servis hit the railing of the central chamber hard enough to drive the breath out of him. The floor below was in chaos. Men were scrambling in all directions, gouts of flame and bolts of lightning illuminating the darkness, torches spinning in the sand under running feet—

And under it all, a stench unlike anything Servis had ever smelled before.

It made his eyes burn and his nose water. He raised a sleeve over his mouth and looked around for an enemy. There were swords sparking, and in the flower of flame that bloomed from the tip of a Venatori’s staff, he saw a mutilated face that chilled his blood.

Black fluid streamed from the creature’s flayed head and down its neck. It pushed its face through the flame that washed over it and then, leaning over the staff that raised to strike it, sank its teeth into the screaming throat of the Venatori. Blood fountained down its chin, and it tore its mouth away with a moist squealch, spitting flesh out on the floor. It hallooed like a screech owl into the night, then leaped upon the next man to dart past it, taint and evil rising off it like the world’s first plague.

A hand spun Servis around. He blinked, dumbfounded, into the face of a Venatori he vaguely recognized.

“My lord! My lord, what should we do?”

Servis surveyed the battle raging below. Darkspawn were pouring up the dungeon stairs like cockroaches.

“What do you think?” said Servis.

From there, there was a great deal of running and screaming in the dark.

Servis did not recall making the decision to go back to his room, but his feet steered him there of their own accord. He kicked down the door, grabbed the groggy Cadril around the waist, lifted him bodily from his cot, and threw him like a cat into the stream of men sprinting down the corridor. He joined the flow of them, and the nightmare began afresh.

It was strangely quiet, between the screams. Every now and then someone would shoot a jet of flame back over their shoulder at the pursuing horde. Servis pushed as he was pushed, keenly aware of the panting of the men in the rear as they fell behind and went terribly silent, their absence creating a maw of growing emptiness between himself and whatever chased behind.

It was by pure luck that the Venatori fled toward the prison’s northern exit. They ran, at times on all fours, up the staircase that led to the upper courtyard. Servis, who was somewhere near the back, heard the roar before he came to the top.

The giant was wide awake now. Whoever was supposed to feed it its nightly drip of brine and whiskey had obviously been distracted, and the beast, hungover and irritated, stood up in its chains. It bellowed at the first Venatori who came skidding to a halt in front of it. Then, with a backhanded slap, sent the man flying through the air to slam spread-eagle against the wall.

“UN!” Cadril was dancing and pointing. He grabbed a fistful of Servis’s cloak and stabbed his finger over and over. Servis saw the rusted chains that attached the giant’s manacles to the stone floor of the courtyard. 

“Smart lad!” Servis focused on the magic inside him. Sucking in his breath, he crushed his fists closed, drawing cold around the base of the chains. He dug his nails into his palms, forced cold inward into the seams and cracks of the metal like a glacier splintering its way into a mountain. He willed it colder, _colder_ —

The metal cracked. The giant glanced down. It lifted is right hand, felt the slack of the chains, and bellowed.

“The darkspawn!” Servis pointed down the stairs. Maker, they were right there. “Kill the darkspawn!”

The giant roared. It took two steps, raised a foot, and began stomping on Servis’s excavation experts.

“Andraste’s _tits_.” Servis shoved Cadril forward and ran. The Venatori were scattered, some flattened against the wall, others attacking the giant, others being torn limb from limb by darkspawn. Servis ducked and spun around them and made for the northern arch.

The northern archway was the entry and exit for patrols venturing out to the Gates of Andoral and Toth. It was the main thoroughfare for traffic in the prison, with its own small stables. Now, as Servis came panting up the sands that led into an upper pavilion, he saw men grabbing horses and taking off into the night.

“Oh you, cowards!” He sent a jet out lightning after one, and the horse toppled over dead. Men jumped and tripped over it, taking off between pillars into the blackness of the desert beyond. Sweat poured down his face, and his upper left rib felt like it was trying to pry its way out of his side. Holding it, he turned to the archway. He could hear the bellows of the giant and the howling of darkspawn below, intercut with the sobbing of his men.

Someone shoved him in the ass. Cadril was pointing again—this time, at the archway.

Servis drew back his staff, charged it, then thrust it forward.

A spear of purple lightning exploded the upper arch. It collapsed, and in collapsing, brought down the rest of the archway with it. Servis staggered back and sat down hard in the dust. He waited for the darkspawn to clamber over the fallen rocks, but none came.

Slowly, he eased himself until he was flat on his back. The constellations in the night sky above were the same here as the ones he remembered learning as a boy in Marnas Pall.

Strange, the things a terrified mind amused itself with. 

Cadril kicked him, and he caught the boy’s ankle in his hand. “Enough,” he said. “We’ll stay here for now.” 

 

* * *

 

By the time the last of the addrenalin had drained from his flesh, Servis’s teeth were chattering. He conjured a globe of fire in his palm and walked with his scribe out into the desert. There were other globes of fire out there, and whispers. Eventually, they found themselves with a small enclave of Venatori huddling under the sheltering stone of a cliff and took refuge there.

They spent that night out there under the stars. The one consolation was that Archivus was dead and unable to tell Servis, “I told you so.”  

 


	4. Chapter 4

 

> Magister Livius Erimond of Vyrantium,
> 
> I have decided to move our base of operations to Echoback Fortress, some three miles north of Coracavus. Our excavation broke through the foundation of the prison and disturbed a darkspawn nest. Not to worry! Our losses were minimal, and I believe the infestation to be a blessing in disguise.
> 
> It has been some time since we had word of you. I do hope your business with the Wardens hasn’t gone awry in any way. Glory to the Elder One.
> 
> Your eternally devoted servant,
> 
> Crassius Servis

 

* * *

 

Servis lay on a cot under his window with a wet cloth over his eyes. His head had not stopped pounding since the darkspawn attack, and he had to convince himself ten times a day that the headache was from the heat and not from the taint worming its way into his system.

The retreat from Coracavus had been a bloody one. The sun had risen on exhausted Venatori curled up on the dunes, many of them dead, many more bleeding and whimpering. Their flight had left them with little water and no food, save what was stashed in the horses’ saddlebags.

Servis had ordered any injured who could not be carried to be left behind. Then they retreated some miles north of Echoback Fortress. Their straggling, bleeding number had staggered up the steep walls of the canyon into the abandoned little fort, and there did their best to organize foraging parties. Servis had appointed five men to stand first watch and then balled up in a shady corner.

When he had risen, it had been to a Venatori handing him a list of casualties.

Servis groaned as a bead of icy water dripped from the rag into his ear. The water muffled his hearing on that side and abated the pounding in his head slightly.

Of the two-hundred and fifty Venatori and slaves who had been stationed at Coracavus, sixty-seven remained. Of those sixty-seven, ten perished within a fortnight from their injuries, and three had to be put down when it became clear they had contracted the taint. The only slaves to have survived were Cadril and three older elves—the rest having been in the dungeons and thus were the first to be killed by the darkspawn.

Servis had ordered his robes burned and any weapons that had been bloodied in the battle to be thrown in a nearby crevasse. The foraging parties returned with antelope and wild roots, and the well proved itself to be drinkable. Servis claimed a turret tower for his new quarters and set about making the fort into something livable.

At night, he could hear the giant howling in the distance.

Servis slapped at a fly on his wrist. A horse whickered in the fort’s tiny stables below his tower, and the hiss and shunt of shovels digging into sand was enough to put him a drowse. Every day for the past week, scouts had snuck back into Coracavus to collect supplies. What little excavatation equiptment could be recovered had been put to use digging out rubble in the fort’s rooms. Echoback, compared to Coracavus, was poor in artifacts.

More worrying was the effect the relocation had on morale.

The men were definitely…discontent. They eyed Servis with an open dislike, and were more likely to be sullen in their duties. That they had so few slaves meant that menial tasks such as drawing water and washing clothes now fell to the sons of magisters who had never done a hard day’s work in their life. It became necessary to remind the men that Cadril was Servis’s scribe and not some free laborer they could grab by the ear to do whatever duty they were too lazy to finish that day. It did not endear him to the men further.

There came a knock at the door. Servis lifted the corner of the rag off his eyes and watched Cadril cross the room and open it. A sweaty messenger stood on the threshold. He gave Servis a ragged salute, then stepped inside without invitation and went to a splintery crate where a bottle of wine sat.

Servis let the rag fall. “Any change?”

“Yes, in fact.” The man tugged out the cork. “We managed to sneak into the main atrium without running afoul of any of the spawn. We thought at first they’d gone back into the Deep Roads, but….” The messenger took a long pull. “We went a little further into the lower courtyard and saw that many of them had swarmed downhill to the gas vents.”

Servis sat up. He peeled the rag off his face and let it drop to the floor. The gas vents were one of Coracavus’s natural defenses. The path that led up to the west side of the prison was covered in poisonous fumes and utterly inaccessible.

“Let me guess, the darkspawn walked right through it?”

“Seems that way,” said the messenger. “Either most of them went back down into the tunnels or they’re all out there in the desert now.”

Servis cursed and rocked to his feet. Macrinus and his patrols were in for a nasty surprise.

“Griffon Wing must be warned.” He went to the little crate and chair that served as his writing desk and plopped down in it. If the darkspawn were out in the desert now, that meant their scouts were in terrible danger. They would need an escort, and the Venatori didn't have the numbers for that anymore.

“Take a mage with you,” said Servis. “Include in your message that no one is ride out alone.”

The messenger nodded.

“Tell me,” said Servis. “Do you think the prison can be reclaimed?”

“You wish to reclaim a prison sitting on top of a darkspawn nest now saturated with the taint, my lord?”

Servis stared at the man. It was disconcerting how the man stared right back.

“We’re all a bit tired, so I’m going to overlook your tone," said Servis. "Give yourself an hour of rest and get the message to Macrinus. I want an answer back from him by—”

The man left without hearing the rest. He took the wine bottle with him.

Servis lowered his pounding head slowly to the splintery top of the crate.

Warden ruins all around and not a single Warden when you needed one.

Things could not get worse.

 

* * *

  

 

> Servis,
> 
> The White Claws killed the Orlesians.
> 
> Must have been a miscommunication. They left the professor alive, but without his team I don’t know how much use he’ll be in catching the dragon.
> 
> I told the White Claws that if they wanted the other half of their commission, they’d have to catch the dragon themselves. Miscommunication being in the air these days, “catch the dragon” is apparently mercenary-speak for “dump rusty traps all over the desert and hope the dragon falls into them.” A man had to have his leg amputated after he stepped in one of the blighted things.
> 
> I doubt these louts have a prayer of catching the clap, let alone a dragon, but it is your coin.
> 
> Artorius

 

* * *

 

 

> Servis,
> 
> There hasn't been a word from Lucanus in over two weeks. I have sent three slaves to the ruins and only heard back from one. The last came back babbling about everything being “suspended in honey” and hasn’t made a lick of sense since.
> 
> I’ve told the patrols to give these “Still Ruins” a wide berth.
> 
> Octavian

 

* * *

   

 

> Servis,
> 
> The Templars are leaving the Approach. When I asked the reason why, they informed me “it was none of my apostate business,” and that if I wanted to file a complaint I could perform a lewd act on Commander Samson.
> 
> What I did glean is that they are apparently moving the bulk of their forces to the Emprise du Leon. Their “mines” are more fruitful in the area, and they want to press the advantage while they can.
> 
> So much for protection.
> 
> Cassius
> 
> p.s. – I’ve put the slaves to working the quarry in the Templars' absence. Six died of heat stroke yesterday. Do you have any you can spare?

 

* * *

  

 

> My Lord Servis,
> 
> A sandstorm in the northern oasis cost us a train of artifacts promised to our Carta contact. She was not happy.
> 
> Enclosed is a writ demanding repayment for the following items lost in transit. I told the dwarf we couldn’t be held responsible for the weather, but apparently these desert nugs have different definitions of collateral than we do.
> 
> Still haven’t heard back from our buyer in Qarinas. I think we may have been written off as dead.
> 
> Ferox

 

* * *

 

 

> Lord Crassius Servis,
> 
> I am sworn to serve the Elder One in His ascension and to aid Him in the the restoration of Glorious Tevinter. However, it would be irresponsible of me to not be blunt in my assessment of Griffon Wing Keep.
> 
> Restoration has gone slower than anticipated. It is hardly my fault, with the tenacity of this desert making it difficult to complete a full day’s work. I have persisted, but the presence of the darkspawn makes the men nervous. They want to know why Lord Erimond has not sent Wardens to protect us, or why the Templars have abandoned us in our hour of need.
> 
> On top of that, one of my patrols reported seeing Inquisition scouts in the northern passes. When I clouted the man, he accurately described the sigil, helmet, and uniform of the Inquisition.
> 
> If this is true, I request further mages to help man the keep. I fear the keep is indefensible and will not survive an assault by an organized force. 
> 
> Your humble servant,
> 
> Prelate Macrinus

 

* * *

 

Servis set down the letter.

Inquisition? _The_ Inquisition?

Sunlight streamed through a hole in the turret tower ceiling. Cadril chased a fly in the corner, snapping at it with his rolled-up shirt. The messenger who had brought the letter stood at attention with his hands behind his back.

“Inquisition scouts?” whispered Servis.

“Aye, my lord,” said the Venatori.

“Inquisition….scouts?”

“Aye,” said the Venatori. “My lord.”

Servis stared at the grain of the crate on which the letter sat. He had counted on the Red Templars to fight the Inquisition, but if the cowards had truly packed up and gone, the situation was more perilous than he feared.

The letters from Livius had been sparse these last few weeks. Ever since the man had gone to Adamant, they had heard nothing. No orders from Erimond, no supply caravans from Venatori to the east. The silence was unnerving.

“Are you worried, sir?”

“About?” said Servis.

“The Inquisition, sir.”

“It’s a big desert. We may have to face a few scrimmages, but they won’t waste their resources uprooting us this far west of Val Royeaux.”

“Shouldn’t we prepare for the worst?”

Servis wiped a hand down his face. "Send letters to the other outposts warning them of Inquisition in the area. We are not to engage unless engaged first. From what I understand, the Inquisition is terribly precious about avenging its fallen allies.”

“Unlike us.”

Servis lowered his quill and looked up. The man’s face was blank.

“Do you have a criticism, Lucius?”

“None, sir. Only some of the men are wondering why we never honored the soldiers we lost in the prison.”

“If they wish to brave the darkspawn to retrieve a bunch of weeks-old corpses, they have my blessing.”

“It’s not that, sir. We never even held a vigil for them. It’s not right. It’s….sacrilege.”

Servis wondered if Lucius would still mumble about sacrilege if all the flesh was lashed from his back. As it was, Servis sighed and dipped his quill.

“Very well. Arrange a fireside service tonight after dinner. Half rations for fasting. I will inform the men that they have you to thank for it.”

Lucius’s lips thinned. He gave a curt salute before turning on his heel.

“Oh? And Lucius?”

Lucius waited.

“Have someone ride to the Gates and make sure they're both secured from our side. We don’t want any unwanted visitors.”

He gave a stiff bow and walked out.

Cadril snapped his shirt. It killed a fly in midair, and the boy gave a silent whoop.


	5. Chapter 5

As it turned out, Inquisition scouts were a bit like bed bugs: the more you tried to convince yourself you didn’t have them, the more you definitely had them.

 

* * *

 

> Servis,
> 
> Five more Inquisition scouts sighted. That makes six and thirty since last week.
> 
> Have you heard the saying about smoke and fire?
> 
> I pray they are merely here as reconnaissance, and will return to Skyhold as soon as they realize we are of no harm to anyone save broken pots and stone tablets. But when have my prayers ever been answered?
> 
> Octavian

 

* * *

 

> Servis,
> 
> Smoke and fire.
> 
> The Inquisition has made camp outside the Gates of Toth. Now that they hold the road, more of them are coming by the day.
> 
> They remain on the locked side, for now, but it might behoove you to make sure the gates are warded nightly. We count at least sixty soldiers so far. We have not engaged them, but it is only a matter of time.
> 
> Octavian
> 
>  

* * *

 

> Lord Crassius Servis,
> 
> I do not mean to alarm you, but if we do not do strike preemptively, the Inquisition forces will box us in.  
> 
> They hold the roads to the east and north, leaving us pinned against the Abyssal Rift and the blighted lands to the south. I am not overly concerned at the moment, given their numbers, but should more of them arrive, we might find ourselves in a tightening noose. 
> 
> It has become more difficult to send messages now, and our supply lines have reported disruption. I understand your desire to avoid conflict with them, but I fear they would not have ventured out to this end of the world if not for our blood.
> 
> I await your orders,
> 
> Your loyal captain,
> 
> Hippus
> 
>  

* * *

 

> Servis,
> 
> Macrinus is in hysterics. He works us like dogs, as if the two Inquisition scouts we spotted skulking around the keep are a full battalion ready to storm the gates. He complains about you constantly, but I’ll spare you the details.
> 
> I have a few exit strategies in mind, should the worst come to pass. No doubt you do as well. I have a list of artifacts promised to our Carta contact, and, despite her grievances with us, she has promised to help me escape the keep during a siege. There is a way out through the well apparently, and I have no intention of dying in the name of a tainted god.
> 
> The offer extends to you as well, if you have a way out of your little fortress. I would hate to make the journey back home alone with only an ill-tempered dwarf as company. Should things go south, be ready to run for the oasis. Grab what you can. We won’t leave this mess empty handed. 
> 
> Listen to me telling you this. You already have a plan, don’t you?
> 
> Artorius
> 
>  

* * *

 

Servis stood atop his turret tower and peered through his spyglass. The brass lenspiece was hot against his eye. Through it, he could see past the two giant statues that guarded the Gates of Andoral, south to where the pinions of Griffon Wing Keep flapped in the wind. From there, he swept his gaze east across the golden expanse of shimmering sand.

“Cassius writes to say that more Inquisition scouts have been seen probing along the quarries,” said the Venatori messenger beside him. “They’ve also been spotted outside the Still Ruins but have not gone inside.”

“A pity,” murmured Servis. He supposed it was too much to hope that whatever had befallen Lucanus would strike down the Inquisition as well.

"We managed to capture one of their scouts, but the man didn't offer up much." The Venatori reading the reports, whose name Servis couldn’t remember—P, something—flipped through his parchment. "He said they were here to exterminate the Venatori presence in the Approach." 

"He used that exact word? 'Exterminate?'" 

"Yes, ser." 

It was times like this that Servis wished Erimond would fall out of the sky so he could kill the man. When he had proclaimed himself willing to defend his post to the death, they both knew he had been bluffing. The idea that the Inquisition would actually follow the Venatori out into the Approach had been so distant, so unthinkable, that there had been little reason to put credence to it. 

And now here Servis was, a smuggler wearing Venatori robes, with a war knocking on his door.

"Do we have the advantage of numbers?" asked Servis.

"For now. We think that is why they have not made a direct attack on us, yet."

"But at the rate they're arriving?" 

"They'll soon have a sizable force here. It won't be hard for them to start picking off our camps." 

"Do they have mages?"

"We've spotted a few in their ranks, but you know how these southern mages are. They're frightened lapdogs, new to freedom. They won't stand a chance against us."

Servis swung his spyglass over the dunes. There, flashing like sunlight off glass, was the rift he had seen his first day in Coracavus. 

"And there has been no word from Erimond?" 

"None, ser," said the Venatori, and then, after a moment, "but it may not be his fault. The darkspawn shoot down our birds as often as they kill our riders. He may have sent a message, and it never arrived. We're very cut-off here in the Approach, and even more so in Echoback." 

"I suppose it's too much to hope that these Inquisition soldiers might retreat in a fortnight," said Servis slowly, "back to some more urgent front?" 

The Venatori said nothing to that.  

"Send a rider to Macrinus," said Servis, collapsing the spyglass. "Tell him to mount the first attack." 

 

* * *

 

> Lord Crassius Servis,
> 
> Our raid on the Inquisition camp near the river went better than anticipated. They were not expecting us, and we cut them down almost to a man. We put the prisoners to the question, and let their screams carry over the dunes. Afterwards, we hung their flayed corpses from the trees. 
> 
> I return now to Griffon Wing Keep. I leave Hippus in charge of the men here at the river. He is more than capable of command in my absence. 
> 
> Your loyal servant,
> 
> Prelate Macrinus
> 
>  

* * *

 

> Commander Servis,
> 
> The Inquisition is a disappointment. With all the tales of them exacting terrible vengeance on those who strike down their comrades in arms, they have made no attempt to reclaim their lost camp. 
> 
> It may be they are not as committed to this campaign as we believed. Perhaps their leadership is merely incompetent. I cannot say. The men are in excellent spirits because of it.
> 
> I believe it best to push our advantage. Forcing them back through the eastern passes and out of the Approach will give us better control of the map.
> 
> I await your orders.
> 
> Hippus
> 
>  

* * *

 

> Hippus,
> 
> You have done well. The Elder One gives us strength, and the false prophet's rabble are no match for our might.
> 
> Now that we have them on the run, we must push them back into the wastes. Doing so will open the roads to us, and give us full command of the desert surrounding Griffon Wing and Echoback.
> 
> Strike the fear of Corypheus in them. You are a son of Tevinter, and the bones of your ancestors are in this desert. Raise the banner of the dragon and serpent high.
> 
> Crassius Servis
> 
>  

* * *

  

> Commander Servis,
> 
> Understood. We ride for the Inquisition camp at dawn. 
> 
> Hippus
> 
>  

* * *

  

> Artorius, 
> 
> Sent a message to our Carta contact. Tell her the roads are about to get clearer.
> 
> Make sure Macrinus gets no wind of it. His sights will be fixed on the Inquisition, and we hardly need him figuring out at this hour that we've been stealing artifacts from under his nose. 
> 
> I will admit, I was beginning to sweat. Echoback is a deplorable place to get caught in a siege, and the thought of being corralled by a host of hostile southerners was dreadful. I have been assured, however, that this far-flung branch of the Inquisition is all bark and no bite. If we keep them on their heels for a season, the desert will drive them out, and we may continue to plunder.
> 
> Servis
> 
> P.S. Did I tell you about the necromantic amulets we unearthed last fortnight? There's a buyer in Nerominian, that gouty cousin of yours, who I know will pay a mint for them if you can convince him the ire of his wife is worth it. Perhaps we can send him along a floral arrangement, perhaps a fruit basket?

 

* * *

 

That night, Servis had a dream. 

He stood atop his turret tower, gazing out over the desert. The moons were massive in the sky, and seemed to bend and distort the horizon like enormous fish eyes. The sky itself was like absinthe, and it tinged everything- from the sand to the stone to the Abyssal Rift in the distance- a jaundiced, sickly green.

His own fingers were curled on the wall of the turret, so pale and glassy that he forced himself to breathe to prove himself alive. The air was neither hot nor cold. The night was utterly still.

It was then that he saw something moving on the desert.

He only noticed its movement because of the sand kicked up from it. The figure was walking slowly toward him, and yet the dust trailed off its footprints like steam from an iron, lifting in the air as if it scorched the very earth it strode upon. The figure wore a cloak, so dark it seemed cut from the night, and it whipped around it like black fire.

Servis’s breath caught in his throat. He should not have felt fear, but there it was. _I am safe behind the walls,_ he told himself. _So long as I stay here, I am safe._

But the figure continued. It walked toward him unhurried. It walked alone, with no fear in the world, the silver dunes flashing beneath its feet, as its black cloak whipped around it like silent, black flame.

Servis felt, with the absolute certainty of dreams, that if the figure reached him, he would die.

 _It cannot reach me here,_ he assured himself. _It will not._

The figure was closer now. The moon struck off the shining baldness of its head—shaved clean, framed by a high, pointed collar. It, _he_ moved like a man walking on the bottom of the ocean, and yet advanced with terrifying speed. He was closer than he had been a second before, too close, until he seemed to jutter across the landscape with each terrible blink of Servis’s eyes.

As Servis watched, the man raised a black gloved fist. It sparked with an evil green light, and Servis stumbled backwards. He hit the stone floor of the turret tower and felt it crumble under him and fell-

down,

down,

down,

down to the first floor. He crashed into the sand hard enough to knock the wind out of him, and lay there wheezing.

_I am lower than I was, but I am still safe. I must be, I-_

He sat up, and found himself naked and exposed in the desert. Echoback Fortress was nothing but dust around him, and he was surrounded only by broken artifacts and broken pots full of sand. 

A black, pointed boot kicked up on a fallen stone. The man loomed over him, his fist hissing with green fire and choked with green smoke.

 _What are you doing here?_   the man asked, in a voice that made Servis quake. His face burned like a star, and his eyes were silver mercury. 

Servis opened his mouth to weasel, to snark, to stall, and realized that he had no answer.

What was he doing here?

Why did he think he stood a better chance of making it out of this desert than his predecessors? Why had he never considered the fact that he was the commander of ruins?

Why had he never imagined he would die? 

 _Fool, you,_ said a voice, and Servis was not sure if it was himself or the man speaking. 

The man raised his hand, and green lightning lashed out at him. It stripped the flesh from Servis's body in ribbons, cutting him to the bone, whipping him until his blood steamed and hissed off his burning marrow. He opened his mouth to scream, but his teeth were on fire, and the only sound that came out was a _squeak_ -

And he awoke with a scream in his turret tower.

Beads of sweat clung to his chest. The night was freezing, but he was alive, and real, and here.

Cadril threw a straw pillow across the room at him. Servis flung it back, missed, and knocked a jug of water onto the floor where it broke into pieces.

"Oh, you _insolent_ boy," he snarled. "Clean that up right now or-"

There came a knock at the door.

No.

Servis closed his eyes and held his breath. If he pretended to be dead, irony could not find him. If he just lay still, then _he_ could not find him. 

Cadril rose and opened the door. A messenger stood on the threshold, peeking in. “Ser?”

“Yes?” whispered Servis from his cot, gripping the covers.

“It’s about Magister Erimond, ser.” 

 

* * *

 

Servis called his lieutenants to the lower dining hall. It was past midnight, and a fire had to be banked in the hearth. Servis sat before the fire warming his hands, his back to the small ring of mages behind him. Cadril stood close by, heating a bottle of wine over the fire with a pair of tongs.

“A rider came to Macrinus earlier today,” said one of the Venatori named Lucius. “He rode from Cassius's camp, where they had captured an Inquisition scout and questioned her. He said there is word of Adamant.”

The silence was ominous enough to make Servis sit back, and the chair creaked. “Continue,” he said.

“The Inquisition annihilated the Wardens,” said Lucius. “Magister Erimond was taken prisoner and taken back to Skyhold.”

A hiss ran around the room. Cadril’s dark eyes lifted from the mulled wine. 

“And?” said Servis.

“He was judged and sentenced the death,” said Lucius.  “They executed him in the courtyard and mounted his head above the gates.”

Cadril’s eyebrows leapt. The slave boy pinched his lips tight, most likely to hold in the biggest laugh of his life.

For once, Servis could sympathize. A strange lightness fell upon him. Erimond was dead. His contract, so far as he knew, was now beholden only to a mysterious god-creature hundreds of miles away.

The possibility of cutting his losses and running was suddenly much more tantalizing.

“I suppose,” said Servis, his voice cutting through the murmur of his men, “it was from the late magister that the Inquisition became aware of our operations.”

“Possibily,” said Lucius. “They probably want to make sure Erimond wasn’t working on anything worse out here than excavation digs.”

Cadril lifted the mulled wine from the flame and placed it on the table. Carefully, gripping the tongs hard so as not to drop it, he began to pour into the cups. The smell of cinnamon and spices rose in the air on little clouds of fragrant steam. The men shifted to it, and Servis waved them to drink.

“Hippus strikes the Inquisition camp tomorrow,” said Servis. He held out a hand, and Cadril passed him an earthen glass filled with steaming wine. “With any luck, he will drive them back into the wastes, and give us some breathing room. Once he has, I will send a messenger east, to ascertain what our next move will be.” He raised his glass. “Glory to the Elder One.”

“Glory,” the men muttered.

“Until then, we continue with our duties,” said Servis. "Thank you, gentlemen. Dismissed. Lucius, you stay.”

The men filed out. Lucius pulled up a chair at the table and nursed his drink. Servis waited until the door closed and the footsteps receded before he spoke.

“Lucius,” he said. “What can you tell me about the Inquisitor?”

The Venatori blinked. The man’s face was shiny with sweat and gritty from the road. He was a soldier, born from a lesser house, and doubtless surprised to have been asked for his opinion.

“My lord?”

“Trevelyan, “said Servis. “What have you heard about him?”

“The same as anyone, I suppose. Fell out of a hole in the sky. Got the glowing green hand.” Lucius sipped his wine. “Friend to no one.”

“Everyone is a friend for the right tickle,” said Servis. “What do you suppose his is?”

Lucius studied him in the low light. “Couldn’t say. Some people think he has a bleeding heart. Likes to collect scum—elves, refugees, that sort of thing. I think he’s just smart enough not to leave a tool unused. He does unmentionable things to slavers.”

Servis drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair.

“Fortunately for us, he’s sitting pretty back in his castle.” Lucius finished his drink and slammed his cup down. “And we’re out here in the arse-end of nowhere.”

“Thank you for that," said Servis. "You are dismissed."

The man sidled out. Cadril collected his mug and downed the dregs of it, then downed the rest from the other glasses. Servis waved him over, then they left the dining hall and returned to the turret tower. 

Rather than go to bed, Servis went to the tiny stone balcony where the astrarium was. 

When they had first arrived at Echoback, Servis had attempted to have the astrarium dug up—the artifact was priceless, and despite its age, in pristine condition. The sand and wind had not disrupted the internal mechanisms, and all the plates were still balanced. Unfortunately, the astrarium was anchored to the stone by a magic unknown to the Venatori, and nothing short of a blast would dislodge it. Thus, they had left it alone, and every now and then Servis would wander out onto the balcony and tinker with it, as if it might tell him what to do.

He pressed his eye to the brass lenspiece and set his hand on it. Immediately, warm magic rushed into the device from its base, spinning its arms and rotating its plates. Taking hold of the delicate arms, Servis spun the sphere, browsing through the constellations of the southern sky.

Inquisitor Trevelyan.

A plan was beginning to form in Servis’s mind. Not even a plan—more like a contingency. The plan was now to salvage as many artifacts as possible from this dreadful expedition before scampering away back home and leaving the Venatori to their fate. But if things took a turn for the worst….

The stars burned quietly in the viewfinder.  If he concentrated, he could connect them like dots in his mind the way he used to do as a boy. He could almost hear the astrarium hum in response as he did so, as if the artifact could sense his fascination. It made him strangely homesick.

“Cadril,” he called. The slave’s bare feet scuffed on the floor behind him. “Do you know your stars?"

Servis lifted his head. The boy stared at him blankly. The sores under his iron collar were red and enflamed as ever, and his shift hung loosely on him.

“I don’t suppose they would mean anything to you. I had tutors to teach me the stars when I was a boy. My parents paid them to take me out on freezing hillsides outside Marnas Pall night after night to stare at the sky. If I fell asleep, they would kick me.”

Cadril scratched the back of his leg with a toenail. Servis sighed and stepped back from the astrarium.

“Grab a crate from inside,” he said. “Come stand here.”

The boy did so, giving Servis a strange look all the while, and climbed atop a splintery crate so that his eye was level with the viewfinder.

“Peer into it,” said Servis. He grabbed one of the astrarium’s arms and shifted it. The sphere spun, warm magic pouring over it, until the star map etched into its stone locked on a constellation.

“This one,” said Servis, “is Satinalis. It is meant to be a drunkard holding a lyre….”


	6. Chapter 6

  

> Lord Servis,
> 
> I do not know where to begin. 
> 
> We advanced on the Inquisition camp as planned. The canyon leading to the camp was narrow and the perfect site for an ambush. I ordered six of our men to scout ahead and report back. After an hour, our scouts returned.
> 
> I wish I could blame what happened next on the darkness. The scouts were not our scouts. They were Inquisition mages dressed in our dead scouts robes, and they attacked with fire and lightning. 
> 
> Valerian's head was ignited instantly. Riccus fell choking on his own blood. We rushed them to no avail, and they pushed us back. Around that time, another attack came from our rear. More Inquisition, this time archers, rose up from the shadows of the canyon wall behind us. 
> 
> It was a massacre. By the time I shouted to warn our men to the danger above, we were alerted to the thunder of hoofbeats. The Inquisition came charging around the corner on slavering drackolisks and sent us running. Those who were not cut down were torn to shreds by the mounts. 
> 
> Over two-thirds of our forces were lost in the assault. The rest of us retreated past the river. The Inquisition gave chase, hounding us and picking us off with ease. It took us half a day to make it back to Nazaire's Pass, half of our remaining number dead or left behind, until our own archers and cavalry were able to fend the Inquisition off. 
> 
> The direct assault was a mistake. Perhaps the fault lies with me for not questioning it more, but I cannot help but wonder if your own self-serving needs did not just lose us the brunt of our forces.
> 
> We have reports that several hundred more Inquisition soldiers just arrived from the East, with many more on the way. What now, Servis?
> 
> Hippus

* * *

   

> Servis,
> 
> The Inquisition has us surrounded. Given that we have not received outside word or aid in weeks, I fear none is coming.
> 
> I will do as I have sworn to do. Griffon Wing Keep can be defended for months if need be, and my only hope now is that the Inquisition does not have the resources for a siege. Echoback is even more defensible, given the gates and gas vents that block its entrances. It may be that our best course of action is to hold and wait. Attacking the Inquisition was folly. 
> 
> Still, the losses come daily now. Either the darkspawn, Inquisition, or desertion takes the riders we send out. Our patrols come back bloody or not at all. 
> 
> Elder One preserve us,
> 
> Prelate Macrinus

* * *

   

> You thick-brained bastard.
> 
> What have you done? Macrinus says the Inquisition has us pinned on all sides. The only way out of the Approach now is either across the blighted lands or by taking a swan dive into the Abyssal Rift. I'd recommend you do both, considering how you and I are now both going to die in this Maker-forsaken hellscape. No more empty assurances, Servis. Do you have a plan? Because if not, there are only so many expletives I can call your mother on a page. 
> 
> Artorius
> 
> p.s. - do you suppose I should I send the Inquisition a fruit basket? 

* * *

 

"They took the eastern mines and put every Venatori there to the sword. Apparently, the Inquisition mounted Cassius's head on a pike," said the Venatori.

Servis uncorked his wine and drank straight from the bottle. 

"They also intercepted a caravan that was headed to Griffon Wing. Some of the freed slaves were later spotted with swords in hand, joining the Inquisition ranks. "

"Quite the ragtag bunch," said Servis, desultorily. 

"Disreputable. Completely lacking honor. By all accounts, they'll take anyone who wants to join." The Venatori shook his head and flipped through the reports. "There's even been a Qunari spotted." 

“A Qunari?”

Something tugged at Servis’s memory. He knew from reports that the Inquisition was an embarrassing mess of mixed ranks—elves fighting alongside humans, dwarves alongside peasants, and in a way that was unheard of down here, mages alongside mundanes. It was not unusual then to hear that there was also a Qunari, or more likely a Vashoth, in the ranks.

But an ominous prickle crawled up his spine.

“Let me ask you something….what is your name?”

The Venatori gave him a long, unblinking look. “Praetorius, sir.” 

“Praeter,” he said. “Have there been any reports about the rifts in the Approach?”

“Rifts, my lord?”

“Have any of them disappeared lately?” At the lad’s continued silence, he added, “Have any of them been closed?”

The Venatori blinked. Comprehension slowly dawned on his face.

“I….nothing has been written in the reports, sir.”

“Write Hippus and Macrinus and make inquiries. Just to be sure.”

“Of course.” The Venatori hesitated. “Lord Erimond did not think the Inquisition would come this far out west.”

“Lord Erimond was incorrect.” About a great many things, as it turned out.

"Ser?"

“ _Yes_?” 

"They freed the slaves," said the Venatori. "The Inquisition did." 

"You said as much. And?" 

“There have been stories about what the Inquisition does to slavers. What _he_ does to slavers.”

“ _He_ is not here,” said Servis. Maker, he better not be. “Trevelyan has better things to do than roam around a desert setting fennec foxes on fire and digging up elfroot.” 

* * *

  

> Servis,
> 
> Do you remember the dragon?
> 
> Stupid question, but seriously. With all this mess with the Inquisition, I didn't realize it had been weeks since we saw it last. Out of curiosity, I decided to make an inquiry. The Inquisition has put up a camp near the draconologist, so we skirted around them to the beast's nesting site. The smell as we approached nearly knocked me off my saddle. You could hear the flies for miles. 
> 
> The dragon is dead. Correction, slain. It looked like it had been hacked to bits, and I can tell it wasn't the White Claws who did it. There were lightning scars on its face, and gouges in its belly from a two-headed axe. Whoever did it in clearly knew what they were doing. I don't think they could have brought a beast like that down otherwise. 
> 
> In any case, all the good bits had either been spoiled or poached. I think the draconologist has the horns. I'd offer to steal them, for whatever they're worth, but he's drinking the Inquisition wine now, so no thanks.
> 
> I should feel relieved. Maker knows the damned thing made off with more than a few of our riders. But all the sight of that dead dragon did was make me anxious. My optimism is in short supplies these days. 
> 
> Octavian
> 
>  

* * *

  

> Servis,
> 
> The outpost at Warden's Point has been taken. Our camps at Death Drink Springs and the Overlook are likewise fallen. Both the remaining mines taken as well.
> 
> They continue to squeeze us against the Abyssal Rift. The canyons have become death zones, and my men dare not range out farther than the Giant's Staircase. The Inquisition is tenacious, and everywhere they hunt us like dogs.
> 
> One of my men says there is a Tevinter among the Inquisition ranks. At first, he thought it one of our own, gone to the enemy's side, but apparently not so. He said he recognized this Tevinter, as a former classmate at the Circle of Minrathous. He could not think of the man's name for the life of him, but he swore that he knew his face. He said this mage had once been a pupil of none other than Gereon Alexius, and that the rumors about his predilections back home were quite scandalous. 
> 
> Perhaps we can turn him to our side. If the man was truly a pupil of Alexius's, his sympathies might be turned. It would do us no small amount good to have a mole in the Inquisition camps.
> 
> Valerian

 

* * *

  

>  Servis,
> 
> I regret to inform you of Captain Valerian's death. He went on a mission to make contact with the rogue Tevinter. He was our best spy, and a brilliant mage. His orders were to merely speak with the Tevinter and to try to cajole him to come over to our side. 
> 
> We do not know what happened to him, but we found him in several pieces the next day. He looked as if he had been exploded from the inside, as if by a bomb.
> 
> Hippus
> 
>  

* * *

 

The mutiny began while Servis was eating his breakfast. 

One moment he was cutting up a roasted lizard with a dull knife, the next a shout went up in the lower courtyard. Servis paid it no heed, until a fist pounded on his door.

"Servis!" The rough voice sounded drunk. "Come out or be dragged out!" 

Cadril, who had been peering through the lenspiece of the astrarium, turned pale. Servis rose slowly from the table.

"With whom am I speaking?" he called. 

"It's Lucius, you coward. The men and I have words for you." 

"Words are typically what one speaks with," said Servis. "What is it you want?"

"Get out here. Now."

"Of course, of course. No need to get impertinent."  

Servis crept over to where his staff leaned in the corner. He swung its strap over his shoulder, then tiptoed over to the balcony where Cadril stood beside the astrarium. Tied around the base of the astrarium was a length of rope. Servis gathered it in his arms and tossed it over the balcony.

"Just a moment!" he called. "You caught me quite indisposed."

Making sure he had a firm grasp on the rope, he swung a leg over the balcony-

Just in time for the door to be kicked in. Lucius and a crowd of surly Venatori were packed in the hallway.

"Gentlemen." Servis swung his leg back over the balcony and clapped his hand. "I am completely willing to listen to constructive criticism on my tenure as your commander. Perhaps we might retire to the war room for a sip of brandy-" 

Lucius pushed into the room with murder in his eyes.

"Now, now," said Servis, giving a wide smile. "Let us use our words."

"Do you all see?" Lucius pointed at the rope. "This coward, this leech, caught in the act."

"When you threaten to drag a man out of his own bedroom, do not be surprised when he takes measures of self-preservation," said Servis. "Now, what is it that you want, captain?"

"The truth," said Lucius. "No more empty reassurances, Servis. We've all seen you skulking about." 

Servis was almost amused. His men were not stupid. They were not blind to the fact that the artifacts they had painstakingly been stockpiling for Corypheus were now being visited, nightly, by their commander, and that he was sending messages off at odd hours, and lurking around the stables, almost as if he was planning on sneaking off and abandoning them to their fate.

Lies. Slander. Servis would, of course, leave them ample weapons with which to fight off the Inquisition when the storm finally broke, as well as the wages they were due. That was more than generous of him.

"I'm afraid you'll need to be more specific," said Servis.

"You intend to abandon us," said Lucius. "We have been gutted, thanks to your incompetence, and now you'd leave us for the vultures."  

"Gentlemen, please, I am as much a victim in this situation as you are." Servis spread his hands out to them. "We have suffered catastrophic losses, been pushed to the very brink. However, so long as we have faith in the Elder One and his plan for us, I am confident we will soon be rescued-" 

"No." The man reeked terribly. They all did. They were a mass of unwashed, malnourished, and exhausted rabble, stranded in a desert fortress a thousand miles from home. "No one is coming to save us. That much is clear. The only sizable Venatori forces remaining in the Approach are ourselves and Macrinus. We cannot remain here." 

"And what orders would you prefer I give, Lucius?" Servis tried a different track, this time taking the tone of an impatient parent. "That we all retreat? Make a daring escape? To where? The wastes? The hundreds of miles of desert haunted by darkspawn, demons, and worse? Or perhaps you plan to go down fighting. The Inquisition, as you said, has all but claimed the Approach. Should you wish to meet them, all you have to do is unlock the Gate of Andoral and ride out into their patrols. Is that what you hunger for? To be hunted like a beast?" 

"I would sooner ask that of you, my lord, seeing as you already have one foot out the door."

"Preposterous. I am not foolish enough to believe I could survive out there on my own." Not without the help of the Carta smugglers who, Servis hoped, were still camped north of the oasis. With any luck, Artorius would meet him there, along with a few loyal and profit hungry men. "But clearly, Lucius, you have gathered everyone here to make a point. If it is violence you desire, then at least give me warning."

"Not violence, merely formality." Lucius drew a rolled parchment from his sash, and thrust it into Servis's hand.

"And this is?"

"My resignation. As of today, I abdicate my post. Better to serve the Elder One faithfully than under the rule of a traitor."

"You cannot be serious."

"I am. There are still places in the desert the Inquisition has not infested. We may break their lines and ride east to the Graves."  

"And all your men feel this way?"

"Every man who wishes to survive, yes." 

"Well, then," said Servis. "Be my guest." 

Lucius had clearly not expected this. "That's all you have to say?" 

"I am but one man. If you desire to leave, then I can hardly stop you. Did you actually need my permission to leave?""

Lucius, Maker bless him, actually seemed embarrassed. He turned haltingly back to the gathered men in the hallway. "We ride. Take as much food, water, and coin as we can carry."

The mutineers spent the next hour scouring Echoback for supplies. The Venatori who were not leaving - all ten of them - watched dully from the shade. Servis stood on the landing overlooking the lower courtyard and stables, doing his best to appear both disappointed and unconcerned. He gave no order to stop the men as they pilfered what little was left in the fort to take for themselves.

Lucius, after throwing his saddle over his horse, turned and pointed a finger at Servis.

"That man is a thief and a liar. He will betray you to the Inquisition the moment he sees profit in it. Take care to cut his throat before he does." 

Servis gave an shrug. The entire courtyard was fixed on him now, including the men who were staying behind. 

"Hopefully, Lucius, when you sober up, you don't regret those words," he said. 

By now, the mutineers had mounted up.  They took most of the horses that were in the stables, and heaped bags of gold and artifacts onto the saddles. Lucius took the biggest gelding for himself. He reined up at the bottom of the staircase below where Servis stood, and nodded past him, to where Cadril leaned in a doorway.

"We take the slave," he said. A Venatori dismounted and started up the stairs.

Servis felt a rush of dread. "What could you possibly need my scribe for?" 

"His life's blood, for one," said Lucius. "We'll need every drop we can get against the Inquisition." 

Cadril darted to Servis's side and dug his fingernails into his arm. 

"I see," said Servis.

The rational part of Servis's mind told him to stand aside. There was little value in picking a fight over a slave. And yet, the harder Cadril dug his nails into his flesh, the more he felt something close to shame. The boy despised him, that much was certain. Hatred burned in his eyes, along with the shine of furious tears--hatred for his fate, for Tevinter, for the Venatori, and, most of all, for Servis.

Of all the judgments Servis had faced today, this one, absurdly, was the one that stung.

Perhaps that was why he swung his staff off his back. Servis pointed a finger at the approaching Venatori and set his cloak on fire.

The man screamed. Fire licked at his neck and face. He tore his cloak off and threw it to the dirt, then collapsed, writhing on the stairs until he lay still.

"There's your blood," said Servis. "Though it might be a little cool by the time you get to the gate."

Servis was dreadfully outmatched, but at this range, it hardly mattered. More than a few would die, and from the unease that crossed Lucius's face, he knew it. Stiffly, he nodded at the burned man on the ground, who was loaded up like cargo, and then kicked his horse. Servis watched him and his mutineers ride out, until the dust cloud faded behind them.

"Well," said Servis, to no one in particular. "We'd best lock the door behind them."

 

* * *

 

The ancient metal statues that flanked either side of the Gates of Androal cast long, cold shadows on the canyon floor and walls.  The hoofprints from the mutineers' horses were still faintly visible in the sand, and iridescent beetles swam in the piles of their dung

Lucius had not left the gate open but he had left it unsealed. The magic that had held it closed had been broken. 

Three men had accompanied Servis. They crowded on their horses behind him, weary and sweat-stained. Servis and Cadril sat their own horses, studying the gate. As Servis reached into his belt pouch for a vial of lyrium, a man behind him said,

"Don't you think we should preserve what we have, my lord?"

Servis fingered the little vial. It was true, he supposed. In the event of an attack, their numbers were now greatly diminished. 

That left only one recourse. 

Servis felt the eyes of the men behind him watching. Weighing him. It would be the simplest thing in the world to cut his wrist and cast the spell on his own.

But no Venatori commander would ever draw his own blood when fresh slaves were nearby. 

Especially not one who had just suffered a mutiny. 

"Give me your hand, Cadril." 

The slave boy startled. The expression on his face was one of hurt.

"I only need a small amount," said Servis, aware of the way the Venatori shifted behind him. "Give me your hand." 

The shock on the boy's face was replaced almost immediately by a complete and utter lack of surprise. He lifted his small hand—scarred over in a dozen places—and turned his palm up. Drawing a blade, Servis pushed the point into the ball of the boy's thumb. Cadril bit his lip, but stayed silent. Fat drops of blood dribbled down the knife, and Servis felt power rush into him like surf into an empty cavern.

He cast a vicious hex on the door. The metal groaned as it twisted in its fittings and sealed flush against the rock. No force, save that of a battering ram, would move it now.

They marched north and made sure the Gate of Toth were sealed as well. As they walked back, sweating in their kaftans under the setting sun, Servis took a handkerchief from his pocket.

“Wrap it around your hand,” he told Cadril, and then, because the men were out of earshot, "we will make out escape soon." 

 

* * *

  

> Servis,
> 
> I have ordered a full retreat. The remaining Venatori have pulled up their camps and are now making their way to Griffon Wing. It is the last defensible position aside from Echoback, and we both know you are not about to open your gates.
> 
> The tide has turned against us. It happened so fast, to the point I think we must have been delusional. We ride now, not as proud sons of Tevinter, but as panting dogs, bleeding and whimpering ahead of the wolves. We thought we were the hunters, and instead we are fools in the desert abandoned by our god. 
> 
> We retreat. I will help Macrinus prepare for a siege upon my arrival.
> 
> Hippus

 

* * *

  

> Servis,
> 
> Hippus is dead. I write this in my saddle as I ride, as we are being hounded deeper and deeper into darkspawn territory. There is no where left to run, and we lack the vigor to turn and fight the band pursuing us. This tow-headed she-elf has been peppering our flank with arrows all morning, and if I have to hear her high-pitched cackling one more time I will-
> 
> [the rest of the parchment is smeared with blood. The bottom half of the letter is barely legible]
> 
> I pray this raven {unreadable] my family please
> 
> oct a vi

   

* * *

  

> Servis,
> 
> The Inquisition was kind enough to lend me one of their ravens before they hang me tomorrow. I would ask that you send my sister and her baby my unpaid wages, but we both know you'd just pocket the coin yourself.
> 
> As such, I'll say only this:
> 
> _Futue te ipsum_
> 
> Ferox

 

* * *

  

> Servis,
> 
> There are many things I wish I could say to you. As you are not worth the parchment it would take to write them all, I will simply say this:
> 
> I sincerely hope the Inquisition feeds your carcass to the varghests.
> 
> By this time tomorrow, Griffon Wing will be taken. Half of my men deserted yesterday by sneaking out of the cistern. I caught Artorius as he was about to climb down the rope, and he was polite enough, under the knife, to reveal the location of the secret cache of artifacts he has stolen from the Venatori on your orders. When I was done tickling his ribs with my knife, I allowed him to make his escape down the well. His skull made a crack loud enough to echo back up to me at the top.
> 
> I have considered sending messages to your men, to enlighten them as to your infamy, but this is my last raven, and no rider will find their way past the Inquisition scuttling out in the darkness. Besides, the gist I've gotten from your messengers these past weeks is that the mood is frankly mutinous in Echoback. No doubt your men will find as creative a way to spill your guts as I have in my dreams.
> 
> In any case, the end is near. Griffon Wing was never sufficiently renovated, and we have been abandoned. This is not where I wanted to die, but I at least have the sweet balm that my death will be far swifter than your own. 
> 
> Because you are the leader of the Venatori. The commander of slavers, blood mages, and murderers. I am merely a stooge, but you? 
> 
> Trevelyan is going to eat you alive. I have seen him. He is here. 
> 
> Your former servant,
> 
> Prelate Macrinus

 

* * *

 

It took the Inquisition half a morning to claim Griffon Wing Keep.

Servis heard the rapport of spells going off at dawn. He stood with his remaining officers on the turret of Echoback Fortress and watched the battle through his spyglasses.

It was hard to tell what was going on. Smoke billowed in black gouts from the keep. Every now and then, a lightning bolt or a fireball would shoot into the sky. At one point, Servis swore he saw a qunari break down the front door of the keep just by hacking at it with an axe, but it was likely a mirage.

They knew it was over when the Tevinter standard was lowered from the flagpole and the all-seeing eye of the Inquisition was raised in its place.

No ravens came to Servis that day or the day after. Caravans of merchants and soldiers began to arrive at Griffon Wing. Some dwarves even started construction on a bridge to cross over the gas vents. Which meant that, sooner or later, Coracavus and Echoback would be open to them.

It would take them time to cut through the darkspawn and the giant, but sooner or later, they would come.

 _You should have begged to leave with Lucius_ , a little voice whispered in the back of his mind. _All that caution and careful planning, and what did it get you?_

The Venatori grew listless. Talking about their approaching demise became an unspoken taboo. It came as little surprise. Mostly, they spend their time drinking, or dozing through the hot hours in the shade. 

Servis invented hundreds of escape plans in his mind. Most of them involved him sneaking, as he had planned, out of one of the gates and making a break for it across the desert. Each time, the plan ended with the Inquisition scouts tracking him down with ease, and then hanging his flayed body from a thorn tree. Or, more likely, it ended with his own men, who now watched him suspiciously, beating him to death with their fists.

His artifacts were gone, his command was meaningless, and his prospects, at the moment, were deplorable. He struggled to think of a worst spot he had found himself in, and came up empty.

To keep his mind from being swallowed by terror, spent more time with the astrarium. Such a remarkable piece of ancient Tevene craftsmanship. The exact thing he was hired to unearth in the Approach.

It gave him an actual shock when, upon tracing the figure of the constellation in the star map, the device clicked. A blue beam of light shot out of the front of the astrarium, cutting through the horizon. Cadril dropped the tray of charred rats he carried in surprise.

And then the star map went dark.

 _There’s my prospects,_ thought Servis, with uncharacteristic grimness. _A Tevinter artifact in the desert. Made useless by my hands._

“I might actually die out here,” said Servis to the empty air.

Cadril gave him a blank look as if to say, “speak for yourself.”


	7. Chapter 7

“My lord!” 

Servis jerked awake. He had fallen asleep at his writing desk. The morning had been spent doing what he had done every day for the past week: writing letters to whomever might be listening. Venatori, Red Templars, Carta, even a few of Servis's old black market contacts in Val Royeaux- it did not matter. One by one, the few remaining ravens were sent out, and none returned.

He ground the heels of his hands into his eyes. "What is it?" 

The Venatori was half-kneeling, half-leaning in the doorway. He was fumbling with the catches of his armor. His staff, held in the crook of his elbow, kept tipping up and hitting him in the face. "The Inquisition, they are inside Echoback." 

"What?!" Servis leapt to his feet. "Where?"

"In the lower yard.," said the Venatori. "Servis could make out shouting now. "They must have gotten through Coracavus."

 _Dammit._ The Inquisition had been building their little boardwalk over the gas vents for weeks. They had apparently finished it. "How many?"

"Four, my lord."

"Four?" A prickle of hope crept up Servis's neck. "Please tell me we're making short work of them."

"No, my lord, you don't understand. It's not just any Inquisition soldiers, it's-"

A flash of green light came from the lower yard. 

It was not the green of an open rift, but a dull, roaring boom, like a miniature sun exploding. It snarled and burned, then snapped shut with a wet spray of Fade like a bitten fruit. 

Oh.

Oh no. Oh no oh no.

Servis grabbed his staff. “Everyone, to arms!” The Venatori streaked out. Cadril was hopping from one foot to the other, dancing in place in panic. “Hide, boy!”

Servis ran outside. The lower yard was in chaos.

Dead men were littered all over the ground. Many of them looked like they’d been pulled apart by an unholy force. Limbs were strew everywhere.

An arrow thwacked in the mantle above his head. Servis cursed and ducked down. A woman cackled somewhere. He crept up the nearest stairs, putting his hand on the back of the Venatori who had just run out of his room and was now crouching on the steps. A yellow haired elf peeked around a corner and shot him in the head.

 _Should have worn a helmet._ Servis pushed the dead Venatori over and made a run up the stairs. As he got to the top, he saw an enormous Qunari cutting a Venatori in half. The Qunari spun in place, his axe winding back to sidesweep Servis's head off his neck. Servis shot a force spell into his gut. The Qunari flew back into a wall, then toppled face down into the dust and did not move.

Servis was halfway across the terrace, when he looked down and saw a man in a black duster calmly striding across the lower yard.

His blood ran cold.

The man in black seemed unconcerned with the carnage around him. His staff was held in one hand, loose and at ease. He was tall, with a shaved head and thick, dark brows. On the back of his left glove, emblazoned in green, was the all-seeing eye of the Inquisitiion. He carried himself like a man who feared nothing in the world.

“Surrender!” The man in black threw his arms wide and projected his voice like an actor. The fighting stopped at once. “Your men are cornered now. There is no dishonor in defeat. Lay down your arms and you will not be harmed.”

The silence in the fortress was absolute. Then a Venatori ran from behind a crate. He heaved his sword, ready to strike—

The man in black raised his hand.

Green light leaped from his palm. Like flaming ice, like crackling fire, it engulfed the Venatori and pulled him apart. The man in black yanked his arm back as if pulling a junkyard dog on a chain, and the green light shrank back into his palm.

Servis’s heart was pounding. It was pounding so hard that he feared it might escape his chest. It should have terrified him, the raw power of that spell—

But what scared him more was the man’s face.

It was as if removing the Venatori from existence had been as simple, and as relevant, as removing a piece of lint from his sleeve. All the tales Servis had heard of Trevelyan described him as a man of persuasion, of amiable arrogance and charm.

There was nothing amiable about the butcher standing in the lower yard. And nothing arrogant either. There was no arrogance in knowing you could tear the world apart at the seams and bend it to your will.

“SURRENDER.” Inquisitor Trevelyan turned in place. “Or die here in the dust.”

Servis should never have come here. It was a bad deal, a bad contract. To hell with Corypheus. His men might be saved, but him? How many Inquisition scouts had he ordered flayed and beheaded? No, his head would be clipped off and dipped in tar to adorn a spike at Skyhold.

He waited until Trevelyan’s back was turned to him. Let no one say he never went down fighting. “ATTACK! VENATORIIIIIIIII!”

He leapt from cover, screaming, and prayed that his fire spell flew true.

As it turned out, he was saved, by his stupidity. A blast hit him square in the back, a punch of force magic so concentrated it stuttered his heart out of its rhythm. His staff flew from his hands and clattered down the steps. He fell and lay gasping on the stone, red light pulsing in his head. He reached for his staff, and a boot came down hard on his wrist. He strained his neck up to see its owner.

“Uh-uh-uh.” A mage with a mustache wagged a finger at him.

The sounds of battle bled back in. Servis caught a glimpse of a laughing elf shooting arrows at the last of his men while a qunari cut them to ribbons, then nothing.

 

* * *

 

When he next awoke, he was in a cage.

The sunlight stabbed into his eyes. Rolling onto his hands and knees, he immediately vomited. There was a bucket in the corner of the cage that would have served him better, but his limbs felt like water, and the thought of crawling, let alone standing, was agony.

When the floor stopped spinning, he sat up and realized he wasn’t alone.

Sitting at Servis's desk was Inquisitor Trevelyan. The man’s black boots were kicked up on his favorite chair. He was reading a handful of missives, a pipe drizzling lazy smoke from the corner of his mouth.

“Inquisitor.” Servis licked his lips. “I can assure you, this is all a misunderstanding.”

Trevelyan ignored him. Up close, Servis saw him as a man in his mid-thirties, with a shaved head crisscrossed with scars. He reminded Servis of a shark. A pale face with sunken eyes, wide mouth, and angular features that gathered shadows. His heavy brows were knitted down as he read. He was unhandsome, strange even, and drew the eye because of it.

“Did you know that Glory Age staff you excavated is a fake?” said Trevelyan around his pipe. Now that he wasn’t shouting, his voice was whispery, almost feminine.

Servis blinked. His thoughts were scattered, caught between the absurd rush of relief that he wasn’t dead, and the suspicion that he very soon would be. “My expert had it authenticated.”

“The man who died on the steps?” asked Trevelyan.

Servis remembered the arrow going into the Venatori's eye. “Yes. Him.”

“Such staffs were reproduced by the hundreds in the Blessed Age. It would take a clever eye to tell the difference.”

Servis wasn’t sure what to say to that.

The door opened, and Cadril walked in bearing a tray with a pitcher on it. The iron slave collar had been cut from his throat. His skin was clean, and ointment had been applied to the sores on his neck. He wore new, fitted clothes, all of which were patterned with all-seeing eye of the Inqusition. Trevelyan took the pitcher from him and set the letters on the plate in its place.

“Thank you,” he said.

Cadril bowed his head. He left the room without once glancing at the cage.

“I see you’ve helped yourself to my staff,” said Servis, regaining some of his wits.

“It’s a talent of mine. Wherever I go, I accumulate squires.”

Trevelyan took a tin from his pocket and removed a pinch of tobacco from it. He pressed it down into his pipe with his thumb. “What do you think Corypheus will do when we leave you tied up on a scout path with missives tucked in your pocket telling how you’ve been stealing from him?”

A cold finger of sweat crawled down Servis’s spine. “Petty revenge is never profitable, as a man of your stature no doubt knows. Why throw away a tool when it can be reused, reshaped, made valuable again?”

Trevelyan puffed on his pipe.

“Inquisitor, you must know, I’m a businessman. I joined the Venatori as a third-party contractor, hired to smuggle Tevinter artifacts out of the desert. I can assure you, I care not one fig for Corypheus.”

Trevelyan took his pipe from his mouth and tapped it. “I could bring you back to Skyhold. You’d wear a placard around your neck with all the names of the scouts your men killed. We’d leave you stocked in the garden, for the soldiers to do with as they saw fit.”

It was hard to believe there were places on Servis’s body where sweat hadn’t already broken out. “A measure of justice, perhaps, in that sentence, but at the cost of insider knowledge. I might work with your spies instead, tell them everything I know about the Venatori in the West.”

“Or….” Trevelyan chewed thoughtfully on his pipe. A scar under his eye was lightning shaped. “I could hand you over to the slaves we freed in the mines--the ones whose friends were worked to death like mules. They expressed a creative interest as to what they would do to you if they ever saw you again.”

Servis’s trousers were so soaked in sweat, he wondered if he would be able to tell if he’d pissed them.

“Inquisitor. Trevelyan.” Servis licked his lips. “May I call you Jack?”

Trevelyan looked at him. The glassy sheen of his eyes was remarkably like a shark’s.

“Inquisitor! Herald! I throw myself upon your mercy. Please, I….I want to help the Inquisition. If you study my notes, you will see I was trying to abandon this excavation. Surely that counts for something? If you kill me, how would your men ever recover the hidden caches of artifacts hidden around the Approach?”

“Through torture, I imagine.”

“I admit it, I’m a toad, a louse, a profiteer of the pain and suffering of others. Just….please. I’ve heard things about you. I know you’re a businessman. An opportunist. A merciful reformer of both people and institutions.”

“I suppose you didn’t hear what I did to Florianne de Chalons, then.” Trevelyan rose. His duster whispered quietly around his legs. He tucked a few of Servis’s missives into the inside breast pocket. “Tomorrow will decide your fate, Lord Servis.”

“Inquisitor? Inquisitor—!”

Trevelyan left the room, and Servis cursed. He had time. Not much time, but a little. He could still find a way out of this, he was sure.

He would find a way to survive. 


	8. Chapter 8

The next morning, two elves came to escort Servis to his judgment.

They dragged him up by his arms. Servis instinctively reached for his magic, and the elf on his left dug a thumb hard into his neck with a spike of dispel behind it. Taking the hint, Servis let himself be led outside.

Echoback Fortress was bustling that morning. Inquisition banners hung on every wall, and servants and soldiers walked quickly in all directions. A few stopped to stare at Servis as he passed. It was alarming to realize that almost every soldier he saw was an elf, and that most met his eyes directly.

The guards led Servis up a set up stairs to a sandy clearing between two rows of pillars—an area that was currently being used as a training ground. A group of soldiers were encircled around it, watching two elves spar with wooden swords. The smaller of the two was Cadril.

The boy wore a loose set of armor, one that was obviously too big for him and had been padded to fit his thin body. He lunged at his opponent, an older elf who shouted approval.

Cadril bared his teeth in a grin. It was the same wild expression of boyish vigor Servis remembered wearing when he sparred with his tutors at his parent's manor in Marnas Pall, so many years ago. 

The thought stirred a strange shame in him. He was almost grateful when the soldiers yanked him forward and led him to a wooden platform at the end of the yard.

Almost.

The platform had a chopping block on it, and was high enough that it could be seen by onlookers. The elves pushed him up the steps and shoved him onto his knees.

 _Calm_. He shivered there in the bright sunlight. _Keep it together and you will walk out of this._

Two figures were sauntering toward the platform and laughing. One was a blonde elf girl who was eating an apple. The other was a mustached mage in silk robes who shared a parasol with her. The two dragged a crate forward and sat down on it, eating fruit and sticky treats as if they were at the grand circus in Minrathous.

“Atten- _shun_!”

The soldiers jumped to their feet and scrambled into a line. At the end of the yard, Inquisitor Trevelyan approached. The huge qunari strode behind him a few paces, an enormous two-headed axe resting across his shoulders. The Inquisitor came around to the small step on the other side of the platform to stand beside Servis.

“Inquisitor—” he whispered, before a juicy apple core smacked him between the eyes. The elf girl cackled, and the mustached mage beside her dragged a finger across his throat, grinning right at Servis.

Inquisitor Trevelyan did not acknowledge the harassment. His black gloved hands were clasped behind his back, and his attention was on the soldiers now assembled before him.

“Until a few days ago, many of you were slaves." Trevelyan's voice carried easily. “You were brought from Tevinter to labor and die in the hot sun on the orders of this man. Many of your friends died because of him. Others were given fates worse than death." 

The faces of elves were a sweltering sea in front of Servis. They stared at him openly, devoid of any pity.

"Inquisitor," said Servis. "I have prepared my own defense. Your people would not give me paper, so I have had to memorize it. By your leave-"

"This is not a trial, and it is not my leave you should beg." Trevelyan spoke again to the crowd. "This man is at your mercy. There is no one more deserving of casting judgment upon him than those who suffered by his hand. Let the one who endured his depravity daily be the one to give him his due."

The crowd parted. Behind the platform, the qunari dropped the head of his axe to the sand with a thud.

Cadril was pushed to the front of the crowd. It had not yet been two days since he fell into the Inquisition’s hands, and yet already his cheeks were fuller, and his eyes were less haunted. He gazed up at Servis with that same practiced blankness that was the mask of all slaves, now with a smug little tilt to his head.

"Thumbs up, he lives. Thumbs down, he dies," said the Qunari. "You got that, kid?" 

"Cadril of Seheron. On behalf of your countrymen, how do you judge?" said the Inquisitor. 

Servis laughed. He laughed as the wind scratched across the sand, and carried with it the great, booming gusts of the vast desert around them. 

It was too perfect.

It was too right.

It was the fate that he most deserved.  

Cadril was waiting. 

“I,” Servis licked his lips, “cannot begin to express how sorry I am—”

Cadril raised his fist and held it level.

“However, however,” said Servis in a rush. “Words are wind, and as my attempts to offer my services as recompense have been ignored, I would like to emphasize the vast network of wealthy contacts and riches I can offer—”

Cadril extended his thumb horizontally.

“None of which mean anything in the face of the horrors of I have done in the name of Corypheus! I am….I….”

Servis’s heart pounded in his ears. He was on his knees, surrounded by Tevinter ruins, at the far end of the world. He met Cadril’s eyes, and wished he could find the answer that would save him in their depths. 

All his life, he had zigged when he was supposed to zag. He had been cocky, and devious, and clever enough to keep his head. Now, there were no games to best. No amount of weaseling, or bargaining, or cunning would save him.

As his mind went blank with despair, the solution offered itself up to him. It was the last thing he wanted to do, and the only thing that might work. 

Crassius Servis would have to do the least likely thing he had ever done in his life.

He would have to tell the truth. 

"I have wronged you," he said. "I wronged everyone under my command and I deserve death. If I were in your position, I would execute me without hesitation, and the world would be a better place for it." 

There was no hint of slyness in his voice. It was as if he was flexing a muscle that had never been used before. He felt sick, giddy, and utterly bemused. Had he ever spoken honestly like this? If so, he could not remember. Once let loose, the words flowed out of him without resistance. The Inquisition soldiers listened in silence.   

"I wronged the slaves, I wronged my men, and I wronged you most of all, Cadril," said Servis. "You were given to me as a blood sacrifice by Erimond, and though I spared your life, I never once saw you for the child you were. I spared your life because you were useful to me. I became fond of you because you were near. Any goodness I did for you pales in comparison with the indignity I put you through. But I would have saved you. I would have. It was always my intention to take you from the Approach with me, because it I disliked the idea of leaving you to the cruelty of the Venatori. If you kill me here today, never doubt that truth. It was the one good idea I had since coming here." 

Cadril's face remained blank. 

Servis swallowed. “And I taught you the constellations, remember?" 

There were _tsks_ of disgust. Even the Inquisitor, who might as well have been a statue, tilted his head. 

“Yeah, can I just chop his head off now, boss? I’m getting sunburned,” said the Qunari.

“Please,” said Servis. “Please.”

Cadril rolled his eyes. With the gesture that was almost obscene, he flicked his thumb up. There was shouts from the crowd. One of the elves tried to whisper to him, but Cadril shook his head.

“Truly?” asked the Inquisitor. 

Cadril shrugged. He gestured with both palms up at Servis as if to say, just look at him.

“Consider carefully,” said the Inquisitor, with that velvet menace in his voice. “It is no simple thing to spare a life.”

Cadril held the Inquisitor’s eye.

“Very well. It seems you have been given your life, my lord, at the discretion of your former slave, no less,” said the Inquisitor. If Servis didn't know better, he sounded disappointed. “You will be brought back to Skyhold to further discuss the terms of your new service.”

“Boo,” said the blonde elf.

Servis planked face first onto the platform. Two strong sets of hands grabbed his arms and dragged him back into the sand.

“Thank you,” he whispered at Cadril’s feet. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

Cadril kicked sand in his eyes, and that was that.

 

* * *

 

The desert shimmered as Servis rode out of it.

"Rode" was an overstatement. He was crowded in the back of a prison cart, his wrists and hands bound with enchanted manacles. The sun heated the floor of his cage and caused him to sweat in his stained and tattered robes.

“You know, I never found out what happened to him, and I doubt you would know him by name, but by any chance do you know what became of Captain Lucius?” said Servis. "He was my second-in-command, and he deserted his post with several dozen of my followers a few weeks before your people showed up."

The Inquisition mage who rode next to his cart held his staff in the crook of his arm. He and another elf had been tasked with escorting Servis all the way back to Skyhold, and thus were also tasked with easing his boredom.

“He lost his head,” said the elf. “We hunted them down in the wastes. Picking you off after was just the clean up.”

“Ah,” said Servis.

The gates of Toth were just visible over the cliffs ahead of them. Servis rested his head against the prison bars of the cart, contemplating his losses.

As they approached the gates, a larger escort was waiting for them. To Servis's surprise, the Inquisitor was there. Trevelyan sat on the back of an enormous red hart, her shaggy fur darkened with sweat. Beside him, Cadril sat aback a drackolisk.

“Harding will ride with you to the edge of the desert,” said the Inquisitor. “The rest of the party is waiting you at Crow’s Rock.”

“Thank you, Herald.” The two elves thumped their breastplates. “Will we be seeing you soon at Skyhold?”

“In time. There is still much work to do here. Safe travels, both of you.”

As they started through the gates, Servis raised his bound wrists in salute. “You won’t regret this, Inquisitor. I can prove my worth to you.”

The Inquisitor turned his back on him and put his heels to his mount. Cadril turned back slightly.

“Be a good squire!” Servis shouted. He didn't know why he felt punchy inside. Cadril would be a good squire. He was proud of that. “I’m sure I’ll manage to keep my head in the meantime.”

Cadril spit in the dirt. Then he snapped his reins, and the drackolisk went slavering away.

 _Well, that’s done,_ thought Servis. _The last piece of business in this whole sorry business._

That chest sent to the dwarven clearing house in Llomerryn would never be claimed. His payment for the lesser pyramids of sanguination would forever be held in deadlock by a bank in Hossberg. His web of contacts would cut their ties with him and wipe their ledgers of his name. His family might attempt to recoup the losses, but he had no hopes of a ransom. Not for a third son who had thought it a clever idea to run south and play archivist in the blighted desert.

The twin statues of the gates of Toth disappeared behind them. The ancient Tevinter ruins faded into the distance. The Approach was in the past, and they headed east back into the lowland.

 _Oh well,_ he thought. _I wonder if the Inquisition will extend a line of credit to me when we reach Skyhold._

Servis began to plan. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who read this. It's somehow the longest fic I've ever posted and by far the least read lol. Servis was such a fun character in the game, and there were so few stories about him that I couldn't get this out of my head. Hopefully, someone out there enjoyed it. :)


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